Hayato Ikeda

Hayato Ikeda (3 December 1899-13 August 1965) was Prime Minister of Japan from 19 July 1960 to 9 November 1964, succeeding Nobusuke Kishi and preceding Eisaku Sato. He was a member of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan.

Biography
Hayato Ikeda was born in Takehara, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan in 1899, and he graduated from Kyoto Imperial University in 1925 before joining the Ministry of Finance. He remained in the Finance Ministry before and during World War II, and he became Vice-Minister of Finance during Shigeru Yoshida's government after the end of World War II. He resigned from the Ministry in 1948 after he won a seat in the House of Representatives as a liberal Liberal Party of Japan member. In 1949, he became Finance Minister, and he became Trade Minister in 1952; he was forced to resign when he bluntly said that it made no difference to him if five or ten small businessmen were forced to commit suicide because of his policies favoring heavy industry. In 1960, he was elected Prime Minister because of his election as President of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, and he instituted statutory minimum wages in 1959, created a universal national pension in 1961, and also promoted the employment of disabled people through the creation of an employment quota system. Ikeda resolved several labor disputes during his premiership, and his ten-year income-doubling plan was actually achieved in seven years. He was forced to resign in 1964 after contracting laryngeal cancer, and he died in 1965.